Manipulating one-way quantum steering in a mechanical gain-loss optomechanical system

Based on the phenomenon of exceptional points (EPs) in the optomechanically induced mechanical PT-symmetric binary and ternary systems, we propose a mechanism to generate the perfect one-way quantum steering between two totally symmetric modes, respectively. By investigating the quantum steering behavior in the close vicinity of EP, we find that the optimal one-way quantum steering can be successfully generated at the EP in the PT-symmetric binary mechanical system. When pushing the system towards the EP, we show that not only is the broadest region of the one-way quantum steering achieved, but the robustness against the thermal noise can be significantly enhanced. In addition, the direction of the one-way quantum steering can be precisely controlled only by altering the sign of the detuning of the cavity field. What's more, we analyze the mean populations of the involved modes to further support our findings and find that the occurrence of the one-way quantum steering depends mainly on the difference in the populations between the two target modes. We also successfully extend our findings to the high-order EP, and the desired one-way quantum steering can still be generated in the PT-symmetric ternary mechanical system when it operates at the EP. Our scheme opens up an alternative manipulation method to explore the various novel quantum effects exploiting the EPs and has significant potential applications in quantum nonreciprocal devices. (c) 2024 Optica Publishing Group under the terms of the Optica Open Access Publishing Agreement